By Dan Ambrose: 38-year-old WBO light welterweight champion Juan Manuel Marquez (54-6-1, 39 KO’s) has decided to play it safe by facing Manny Pacquiao look alike 23-year-old Al Sabaupan (19-1-1, 14 KO’s) on July 21st in a still to be determined venue in Mexico.

The southpaw Sabaupan is being used to give Marquez a tune-up to get him ready for a possible fight against Pacquiao on November 10th should Pacquiao decide not to face Tim Bradley in a rematch after losing to him recently.

Although Sabaupan looks a lot like Pacquiao in his facial features, he’s nothing like him in fighting style other than being a southpaw like Pacquiao. He’s not as fast nor as powerful as Pacquiao, and I wonder what’s the point in Marquez wasting a perfectly good title defense on facing him. Sabaupan isn’t a welterweight.

He fights at lightweight, which makes him completely useless to get ready for Pacquiao, who fights at 147. It just looks like Marquez is playing it safe to keep from getting beaten by one of the top light welterweight contenders such as #1 Mike Alvarado or #2 Ruslan Provodnikov. Both of those guys would be a huge handful for the soon to be 39-year-old Marquez, and I don’t like Marquez’s chances against either of them. Even if Marquez could beat them, those fights would be grueling affairs with Marquez taking a lot of punishment.

He’s fighting at 140 lbs now, and those guys would really push Marquez hard. Sabaupan is a lot smaller than those guys and he’s not a big puncher. In other words, he’s a nice safe pick for Marquez. The problem here, though, is what will Marquez do if Pacquiao decides on not facing him in November.

Marquez can’t keep digging for fights in the lightweight division in defending his light welterweight title, and I could see him having to defend his WBO strap against either Alvarado or Provodnikov. In that case Marquez might have to vacate the title in order not to risk getting beaten and losing out on the Pacquiao fight.